Rebecca Martin

Rebecca Martin has taught English in Egypt, Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Saudi Arabia. Her publishing credits include McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Inkwell, The Dos Passos Review, and the Los Angeles Free Press. She has an MFA in Creative Writing from Vermont College.

Rebecca Martin: As far as the current penalties are concerned, it’s worth noting that earlier the Ministry of Justice had ruled to withdraw the lawyers’ licenses—and fined them of amounts as high as 500 thousand riyals. [Their final penalty is six times that.]

Rebecca Martin: In Sanaa, you can still see the occasional photo of Saleh, his chin lifted, eyes squinting in focused determination. Over the years, he and his cronies have looted the country of an estimated $60 billion.

Rebecca Martin: Under Saudi Arabia’s work visa system, people are kept in a state of permanent dependency on their sponsors. A worker can’t quit or change jobs, can’t invite a spouse or children to join her, or exit the country without her employer-sponsor’s permission.

LGBT Rights

Irene Monroe: Long before June officially became Gay Pride Month, and October “Coming Out Month” for the LGBTQ community, Halloween was unofficially our yearly celebrated “holiday,” dating as far back at the 1970s when it was a massive annual street party in San Francisco’s Castro district.

The Middle East

Richard Greeman: Anti-government demonstrations spread across Morocco after social media spread the story of Mousine Fikri, a fishmonger crushed to death inside a garbage truck as he tried to block the destruction of a truckload of his fish confiscated by police.